(A Few, Though, I Didn't Make Up)

Entries tagged with work lisa

She stared at the ceiling. It was easy last night to avoid thinking about the afternoon phone call, but here, hours before the alarm would go off, there would be no avoiding it. Maybe if she reached over and played with the boy snoring next to her, she could put it off a little while...

She sighed. Now that the phone call had taken root in her mind, she wouldn't be able to focus, and, given the boy's condition, she'd have to do most of the work. Fuck.

"Lisa Green?" the man at the other end of the line had asked yesterday afternoon.

"Speaking," she'd told him.

"This is Steve Hartmann? From CUNY? In New York?"

For just a second, her heart and lungs had just stopped. "Hi?"

"I wanted to talk to you about your CV and letters of recommendation. Do you think it would be possible to schedule an interview sometime this coming Thursday or Friday?"

"Yes."

"I know it's short notice," he'd apologized.

"I can be there."

"But we need to fill the position next semester."

"I can make it work."

"And you live in Montreal, and most of the applicants live in the area, but you are extremely qualified, and we'd really like to meet you in person."

Ordinarily, she'd pick that time to shout to get this guy's attention, but this was someone whose good graces were crucial to her future. She decided to wait until he finished.

She was glad she did, because he had good news: "We're aware of the hardship this will be, so we'd like to reimburse you for your airfare." And bad news: "But due to budget cuts, you're on your own for sleeping accommodations."

"I'll see you Friday."

Clearly, she hadn't thought this out. She couldn't really afford to get a motel--the flight would come close to maxing out her credit card. She could always stay at a friend's place, but she didn't have any friends in New York. She did know people there, but one she didn't want to see again, and the other didn't want to see her again.

Fuck.

As quietly as she could, she rolled out of bed into a her jeans, pulled on a pair of heavy socks, shrugged on a parka, and tiptoed to her balcony. She stopped when, for a just second, and for the first time she could remember, she thought the weight in her jacket pocket was a half-empty pack of cigarettes with a lighter stuffed into it. And for just a second, she was so relieved that she didn't have to ride out the sting of this bitch-slap of a day alone. And then she realized it was only a phone.

Not long after Steve Hartmann had called her, she'd met her boyfriend at that franchise coffee bar, just like they always did after classes, squirming in her seat.

Her grin echoed in his face as he sat down and asked, "What's got you all worked up, babe?"

"I'm going to New York!"

He'd frowned. "When?"

"This weekend!" She shrugged. "Well, Friday."

"But..."

She always found his confusion adorable. Even more adorable was how easy it was to make him that way.

"But," he continued, "we're going to that dinner party at Gabe and Marilyn's this weekend."

"They'll understand."

"I don't understand."

She'd fought off the urge to keep herself from squealing like a little girl, because that's something Lisa Green never did. "CUNY!"

His eyes widened in disbelief.

"It's only an interview," she clarified, "but they practically begged me to come in. That's a great sign, don't you think?"

"What if they make an offer?"

"I'll pretend to play hardball, but I'm going to take what they can give me."

"Oh."

It was then that she recognized that the disbelief wasn't the kind of giddy excitement she deserved.

"What do you mean, Oh?"

"Aren't we going to discuss this?"

"We already discussed this," she reminded him.

He didn't reply.

"You told me I should go for it. That I needed to go for it. You know how much this means to me."

She set her jaw and took a deep breath through her nose. "Brody, that has to be the coldest way anybody has ever dumped me."

"Wait a minute," he said. "I never said anything about dumping you!"

"You did just now."

"We can't end this because of that!" he pleaded. "We're going to move in together!"

"You just saved yourself some trouble then."

"Come on, babe! I'm sorry!"

"So am I." She stood up and whipped her jacket off the back of her chair.

"But I love you."

She loved him too, but, Jesus. Did he really think that? She had to get out of there.

"Don't go, Lisa."

But she did.

Now, as the cold air burned her lungs, she asked herself if she'd overreacted. The answer was easy; she had. Still, this simplified things. Five and a half months was hardly enough of a relationship to bear the burden of long-distance--or even a mutual move. And it sure as hell wasn't long enough put up with that kind of shit coming out of his mouth. Besides, he hadn't called at all over the past nine hours. He was probably waiting for her to apologize. He didn't know her at all.

Still, she felt like such an asshole.

Goddammit. How the hell was she supposed to dazzle the folks in New York with this Brody-shaped hole sucking her in?

She took her phone out of her pocket and checked the time. Four thirty. Her alarm wouldn't go off for another hour and a half. The best way to pass the time would be to get her mind off of things she couldn't fix right now, and the only idea she had to do that would be to go inside and fuck the boy in her bed.

When her alarm went off at six a.m., her first impulse was to smash it to death with the table lamp. Instead, she held the urge back, picked up the phone, moaned, and shut it off. She rolled out of bed and rested her heels on the hardwood, cold-as-fuck floor and came close to crying out the dirtiest word that came to mind that day, just like she wanted to every morning. And, just like every morning, she swallowed it. This was her own fault for moving to goddamned Canada after growing up in a goddamn desert.

New Mexico. Shit. What did she have to go thinking about that for?

She closed her eyes, took a breath, and restrained the thoughts that wanted desperately to run there, steering them in the direction of the day ahead.

Shit. That didn't help.

She focused on the next ninety minutes.

That did it.

As she shuffled into the bathroom, her hand instinctively swept up a bottle of mood stabilizers and fumbled fruitlessly with the childproof lid. She barely kept herself from hurling it at the wall. After a great deal of concentration, she finally got the pills down her throat, leaving her free to speculate on the person watching her on the other side of the sink. Five years ago, that person would have been hung over. Ten years ago, she would have been crying. Twenty years ago, she would have been whining. This morning, she was calm, naked, and Zen with the events of yesterday.

She shook her head before wrapping her hair in a ponytail, slipping into a pair of track pants, pulling a sports bra over her head, making the necessary adjustments, zipping up a thick hoodie, and lacing up a pair of sneakers. On her way out the door, she leaned over to kiss the boy in her bed on the cheek. She wanted to tear off her clothes and fuck him, but she told herself she couldn't.

"Pete," she whispered, "I need to go to work."

"Why?" he mumbled.

"It's work."

"Oh." He rolled over. "Call me later?"

"If I feel like it."

Poor Pete--her perpetual rebound. She could tell he had been falling for her for a while now. She should probably stop calling him after days like yesterday, but she hated sleeping in a cold bed. Maybe she should just get a goddamn cat, like every other librarian.

It didn't take long to get to the gym, where she wrapped her hands and stretched. Here, in front of the heavy bag, her weight on the balls of her feet, her gloves up to keep from getting hit in the face again, it was okay to give in.

Five years ago, someone who maybe understood her more than anybody in the world--the person she hated most--walked out of her life.

She bounced back for a second and had to admit that she and love just didn't get along.

Over her shoulder, she caught a glimpse of some person bouncing around in the reflection of the room. Teeth clenched, sweat and tears stinging her eyes, muscles tight, lightning searing her bones, she looked like someone she used to know.

One more round to go: Six. Right uppercut. Me.

After a long shower, she didn't have to worry about holding anything back anymore--the medication had kicked in, taking care of most of it; the rest had been rinsed away. It had taken a long time for her to stop hating herself so much that the world wanted her gone; simultaneously, it had taken a long time for her to stop loving herself so much that the world wanted only to do her bidding. Now, with her collar straight, her hair swept back, and her makeup alluring-but-subtle, she was just another twenty-seven-year-old on her way to work.

A long day beckoned. She needed to have a talk with her more-likely-than-not-ex-boyfriend, she needed to figure out whether or not to keep stringing Pete along, and she needed to pick up her phone and call the man who'd told her specifically never to "ever fucking dare" ask him for anything ever again and ask him for something. In other words, she needed to clean up a series of messes she'd made. In other words, it was business as usual.

She studied the woman in front of her, through the rouge, the eye-shadow, lipstick, and brushed-out hair. "Yeah," Lisa Green said. "I'm still in there."